The Cult of Pedagogy Podcast

Here they are: My six favorite ed tech tools for this year. They are not all brand-new, but I don't think any of them are getting the attention they deserve. Each one has the potential to make a real difference in your teaching. And there may just be one or two surprises at the end...

Maureen Blaha, Executive Director of the National Runaway Safeline, sheds light on the critical issue of runaway youth in the U.S. She discusses the alarming statistics and factors driving youths to leave home, particularly the vulnerability of LGBTQ individuals. Blaha emphasizes the essential role teachers play in prevention, offering strategies to spot warning signs and promote open communication. The importance of resources like crisis intervention hotlines and the 'Let's Talk' curriculum to empower at-risk youth is also highlighted.

Can studying be taught? I interview cognitive psychologists Megan Smith and Yana Weinstein about six high-power, research-based learning strategies most teachers don't know about. These can be used in instruction and should be taught to students so they can use them in their own studying. If you enjoyed reading "Make It Stick" last summer, you're going to love what you learn in this episode!

This episode is a goody bag for everyone! My buddy Mark Barnes, publisher of the Hack Learning series, shares some of the best ideas from all nine of the books in his series. If you don't walk away from this episode with something new to try, then I'll refund you the price of the podcast. Just kidding. It's free. But you get what I'm saying, right?

So many regular ed teachers feel inadequately prepared to serve the needs of students with special needs. In this episode, special educator Jam Gamble shares five ways regular ed teachers can make their classrooms more welcoming for special ed students.

Genius Hour has exploded in classrooms over the last few years, and teachers who want to try it have a lot of questions. In this episode I ask A.J. Juliani, creator of the Genius Hour Master Course, the top 10 questions teachers have about Genius Hour, and he gives me some great answers.

I've got a bit of a rant to share with you in this episode, and it has something to do with Grecian Urns. Chances are you have one or more of these in your lesson plans, and in this episode I'm going to help you find them and get rid of them.

If we want to make our content really relevant to students, we need to design our instruction the way a chef orchestrates a good meal. Rather than giving in to the educational equivalent of processed food, we could be putting more thought into preparing our lessons, from the appetizer all the way to dessert. In this episode, I interview John Stevens and Matt Vaudrey, authors of the book The Classroom Chef. They talk about how they evolved from teaching uninspired, by-the-book lessons to preparing learning experiences that truly engage students. If you're starting to feel like you're phoning in your lessons, you won't want to miss this one.

So much of learning depends on whether your students feel comfortable taking risks. In this episode, I share some suggestions for making your classroom an academic safe space.

If you're always looking for short, high-quality informational and literary texts to use in your classroom, you are going to love the free online library at CommonLit. In this episode, I interview CommonLit founder Michelle Brown to talk about why she started the platform and walk through all of the wonderful features that help teachers get the most out of this growing library of texts.